17 November 2012
State of SSEC
2012
Hank Revercomb, Director
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Space Science and Engineering Center
13 December 2012
Topics
A. “Big Picture” Items
B. SSEC, the Center
C. Education & Public
Outreach
D. Our Science &
Engineering
2
A. “Big Picture” Items

“Sandy” dramatically demonstrates huge advances in
prediction capability, now strongly reliant on satellite data

New Polar Satellite now “Suomi NPP”:
- IR measurements from CrIS and VIIRS had first light in 2012.
- VIIRS Day/Night Band has forecasters buzzing
- Community Satellite Processing Package (CSPP) continues long
SSEC/CIMSS heritage of getting products to the world

Some observing opportunities still Squandered:
(1) Climate Change programs, CLARREO and Zeus, as well as
(2) Advanced GEO Sounding

STORM from GeoMetWatch could fix the sounder problem

Federal Agency Budgets: NASA, NOAA

UW-Madison: Human Relations (HR) Plan holds promise for new
merit and advancement opportunities

Memorable High Profile Visitors
3
Hurricane Sandy Media Coverage: SSEC in the News
•
•
•
•
•
•
UW Weather Scientists at Forefront
of Accurate Sandy Forecasts
Wisconsin State Journal, 11/2/2012,
11/2/2012
UW Helps Forecasters Predict
Hurricane Sandy
WISN Channel 3 TV, Madison, WI,
10/30/2012
UW-Madison Scientists had Key Role
in Helping Forecast Sandy
Journal Sentinel, 10/31/2012
Sandy: The Power-Outage Aftermath
through VIIRS, GOES-R and JPSS
National Centers Persp., 11/1/2012
Blackout in New Jersey and New
York
Earth Observatory, 11/1/2012
Suomi NPP Satellite Captures
Hurricane Sandy’s Mid-Atlantic
Blackout
NASA, 11/2/2012
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
UW-Madison Scientists Share
Critical Satellite Images
WMTV, Madison, WI, 10/29/2012
UW Scientists Track Sandy's Fury
University of Wisconsin-Madison
News, 10/30/2012
NASA/NOAA's Suomi NPP Captures
Night-time View of Sandy's Landfall
NASA, 10/31/2012
NASA Satellites See Sandy Become
a Hurricane Again and Strong Winds
Expand
NASA, 10/27/2012
Satellites Monitor Hurricane Sandy
Space Ref, 10/27/2012
Hurricane Sandy Super Rapid Scan
NASA Earth Observatory, 10/29/2012
Computers, Pinch Of Art Aid
Hurricane Forecasters
National Public Radio, 10/26/2012
Hurricane Sandy: A
Forecast Success Story
How far have we progressed in
predicting hurricanes? Chris Velden
Hurricane Andrew 1992
Official forecast, 3 days prior to landfall
Verification
Warning lead time for actual landfall location, only 1 day. Why?
Hurricane Andrew 1992
NWP Model Forecasts
Out to 3 days
Position at 2pm,
August 21st
Position at 2pm,
August 24th
Three days out, none of the NWP model guidance
(colored tracks) correctly forecasts the landfall over
south Florida.
Hurricane Katrina 2005
Warning lead time for actual landfall very good, ~3 days
Hurricane Sandy 2012
ECMWF model ensemble track forecasts out to 5 days
Observed track
Deterministic run
Ensemble forecasts
The NWP predictions have obviously gotten much better. Why?
Hurricane Sandy 2012
Lead time for accurate landfall location, ~5 days!!
Why the tremendous improvement in 20 years?
Part of the answer is model resolution-hurricanes resolved
Key Reason:
Better Assimilation of Better Satellite Data
NOAA Center for Weather and Climate
Prediction (NCWCP) opens 15 October
Key new facilities
will foster progress
in US prediction
capabilities
Louis Uccellini cutting the ribbon
officially opening NOAA’s CWCP
Celebrants include Barbara Mikulski, U.S. Senator,
Maryland; Acting Commerce Secretary,
Rebecca M. Blank; and Dr. Jane Lubchenco,
NOAA Administrator.
New home of NCEP
NESDIS STAR &
OAR Air Research Lab
Community Radiative Transfer Model (CRTM)
Speedup for Double Precision Accuracy
190x
200
180
146x
160
140
99x
120
100
80
52x
60
40
20
0
1 GPU
2 GPUs
3 GPUs
4 GPUs
GPU-accelerated WRF modules
WRF Module name
Speedup
Single moment 6-class microphysics
500x
Eta microphysics
272x
Purdue Lin microphysics
692x
Stony-Brook University 5-class microphysics
896x
Betts-Miller-Janjic convection
105x
Kessler microphysics
816x
New Goddard shortwave radiance
134x
Single moment 3-class microphysics
331x
New Thompson microphysics
153x
Double moment 6-class microphysics
206x
Dudhia shortwave radiance
409x
Goddard microphysics
1311x
Double moment 5-class microphysics
206x
Total Energy Mass Flux surface layer
214x
Mellor-Yamada Nakanishi Niino surface layer
113x
Single moment 5-class microphysics
350x
Pleim-Xiu surface layer
665x
28 October 2011
“Suomi NPP!”
Announced at AMS
NASA’s Grunsfeld at AMS
Verner E. Suomi
1915-1995
NPP VIIRS Image, GSFC
17
Cross-track IR Sounder
(CrIS) Heritage
2006-
CrIS
2011-
(2211 ch)
1330 Suomi-NPP
IASI
(8461 ch)
0930 METOP
2002-
AIRS
(2378 ch)
1330 Aqua
1990/91
ITS
(~CrIS)
Design Study
1986-
1978-
HIRS
(20 ch)
HIS,
S-HIS,
NAST-I
It took a while!
Spectral Resolution and Coverage Comparison
AIRS:
L1B: > 1200
Resolving Power
9 FOV/50km square
IASI:
L1C:±2 cm OPD
Gausian apodized
4 FOV/50km square
CrIS:
±0.8, 0.4, 0.2 cm
OPD unapodized
9 FOV/50km square
CrIS:
±0.8 cm OPD
unapodized
9 FOV/50 km square
Full Resolution
wavenumber
LBLRTM calcs for US Standard Atmosphere
19
Suomi-NPP launched
28-Oct-2011
CrIS first light data
20-Jan-2012
900 cm-1 BT (K)
SSEC In-house
Calibration Package
provided only valid
results for months
20
Sample “1st Light” spectra (20 January)
Overlays for a uniform 3x3 FOR
Carbon Dioxide
Dave Tobin
21
Sample spectra for a uniform 3x3 FOR on 20 Jan
22
Full Resolution SW band from CrIS
Routine downlink to start mid-2013
Note
beautiful
CO lines
Many CO2 lines for spectral Cal
Calibrated with UW/UMBC CCAST
23
Water Vapor Map from CrIS
Especially important given lack of WV channels on VIIRS
24 February 2012, 1580 cm-1
24
Summary

CrIS instrument performance is
exceptional
 Very low noise
 Very stable and accurate
 Provides excellent baseline for
future upgrades

Recently declared Provisional Status
 Further small refinements expected at a later date
 Validated status expected mid-2013
 ECMWF and UKMET Office have demonstrated positive
impact on early assimilation tests
CrIS on Suomi NPP is part of a fitting tribute to Verner Suomi
25
Community Satellite Processing Package
offers World-wide Access
Allen Huang, Liam Gumley, Kathy Strabala, Scott Mindock, Geoff Cureton,
Ray Garcia, Graeme Martin, Elisabeth Weisz, Nadia Smith
• A software package for processing Suomi NPP, JPSS, POES,
Metop, and FY-3 direct broadcast data.
• Have released multiple versions of the VIIRS, CrIS, and ATMS
SDR software.
• CSPP is now used operationally by EUMETSAT, UK Met Office,
MeteoFrance, and national agencies in Sweden, Norway,
Mexico, South Africa, Australia, Japan, China, Russia…
SSEC DB Antenna
First Suomi NPP DB received data on 2012/02/23
VIIRS processed by CSPP outside the US
Courtesy of Timo Ryyppö, FMI, Sodankylä, Finland (Suomi!)
VIIRS M7 2012/03/05
SSEC Direct Broadcast from
Suomi NPP added 23 Feb 2012
L Band for
Suomi NPP
&
X Band for
other Polars
Coverage
12/14/2012
Original
X Band
for other
Polars
28
1st VIIRS from Suomi NPP DB pass at SSEC
VIIRS True Color (M5/M4/M3)
VIIRS Infrared (M15)
2.4 meter X/L System, 20:30 UTC, 2012/02/23
29
1st CrIS from Suomi NPP DB pass at SSEC
CrIS 900 cm-1
2.4 meter X/L System, 20:30 UTC, 2012/02/23
30
1st ATMS from Suomi NPP DB pass at SSEC
ATMS Channel 16
2.4 meter X/L System, 20:30 UTC, 2012/02/23
31
The Valley of Death is Being Crossed
From the NWS Milwaukee WFO Website 2012/11/26
VIIRS DNB data acquired by direct broadcast at SSEC, and processed by CSPP
12/14/2012
32
Suomi NPP VIIRS offers a New View of the Night
A unique
visible
look at a
Tropical
Storm at
Night
(0.8 km
resolution)
07:09 UTC
28 Aug 2012
Data captured
and processed
in real-time at
the University
of WisconsinMadison Space
Science and
Engineering
Center using
CSPP Software
Tropical Storm Isaac from Day/Night Band in AWIPS
VIIRS Day/Night Band (DNB)
Tropical Storm Isaac in AWIPS
Animation between Day/Night and IR 11 micron band
07:09 UTC 28 August 2012
Hurricane Sandy
27 Oct 2012
Data acquired
and processed
at SSEC using
CSPP and
Polar2grid
Software
Part of JPSS
Press Release
Kathy Strabala
Wowed NWA
in Madison
&
Jim Cantore,
The Wx Ch,
responded with
“Awesome
image!! keep
em coming”
when
Liam Gumley
sent it to him
Hurricane Sandy Environment from VIIRS Day/Night Band, 29 Oct
London Lights from VIIRS Day/Night Band
Aurora Australis from VIIRS Day/Night Band
Will Straka
Convection under Full Moon from VIIRS Day/Night Band, 1 May
Uganda
Kenya
Kampola
Congo
Nairobi
Goma
Rwanda
Burundi
Mombasa
Tanzania
Will Straka
Convection under Full Moon from VIIRS Day/Night Band, 1 May
Uganda
Kenya
Kampola
Congo
Nairobi
Goma
Rwanda
Burundi
Mombasa
Tanzania
Will Straka
Nuclear Icebreaker in Arctic from VIIRS Day/Night Band, 23 Nov
Kotelny Island
Sakha, Russia
Icebreaker NS Rossiya
 77 N
N
Will Straka
Status of High Spectral Resolution IR:
A Period of Opportunity
Realized and Squandered

Polar Wx Realized (CrIS & IASI)

Climate Benchmark & Intercal:
Squandered* CLARREO delayed
indefinitely, and Earth Venture
Proposals (Zeus EV2 & EVI) rejected.
We will keep trying!
* delayed indefinitely
42
We already have the Prototype
Absolute Radiance Interferometer



OARS
HBB

Fore

Optics
Absolute Temperature Calibration
Using Multiple Phase Change Materials,
plus Heated Halo emissivity
and Inst. Line Shape (ILS) measurement
ABB
43
The good news
Tropospheric
Emissions
Monitoring
of
Pollution
Brad Pierce is on
the 1st NASA
Earth Venture
Instrument
winning team
44
Status of High Spectral Resolution IR:
A Period of Opportunity
Realized and Squandered

Polar Wx Realized (CrIS & IASI)

Climate Benchmark & Intercal:
Squandered* CLARREO delayed
indefinitely, and Earth Venture
Proposals (Zeus EV2 & EVI) rejected.
We will keep trying.

GEO Severe Wx: GIFTS/ HES for GOES-R
Squandered** (in US—Europe and China proceeding),
but GeoMetWatch still offers a Fix
* delayed indefinitely **should be in orbit / removed from plans
45
47
SSEC/GMW Exclusive Agreement
signed on 20 April 2012
…….. For SSEC to provide the services in
(1)
(2)
(3)
developing algorithms and operational software;
developing, operating, and maintaining data center systems for the collection,
visualization, distribution, and archiving of atmospheric and weather data associated
with initial and future hyperspectral sounding instruments relating to the Project;
providing system engineering, flight hardware (onboard calibration system), testing,
and calibration/verification to the Project.
Allen Huang, a moving force for this effort, took the picture
NASA future funding flat-lined
Planetary science is a big loser (over 20% down from 2011/12)
Little change from 2011/12, but up 25% from 2010
7th Highlight of 10 for 2013—climate not listed as a threat
Flat-lined future budgets—2013 down over 10% from 2010
From Lubchenco, 16 Feb 2012
Shows growth since 2008
From Lubchenco, 16 Feb 2012
From Lubchenco, 16 Feb 2012
From Lubchenco, 16 Feb 2012
Issue over
Operational Satellite Build Responsibility
 Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), in April said
“Unfortunately, the (Senate) Committee has lost confidence in NOAA’s
ability to control procurement costs or articulate reliable funding profiles.
Therefore, we have taken the unprecedented step of transferring
responsibility for building our Nation’s operational weather satellites from
NOAA to NASA”
 NOAA/NESDIS
Independent Review Team, in July,
after stating that
“The success of the NOAA satellite enterprise is critical to the United
States.”
and noting serious problems with NOAA
program management, recommended to
“Reaffirm NESDIS as the primary accountable organization for the
execution of NOAA satellite programs”
New UW Human Relations Plan
Excerpt from Executive Summary
Thanks to Wayne Feltz, Mat Gunshor,
Denny Hackel, Jenny Hackel,
Mark Mulligan, and Dave Tobin for
representing our interests in the process
High Profile Visitors
Kathryn Sullivan
Assistant Secretary of Commerce for
Environmental Observation &Prediction
and NOAA Deputy Administrator
The
Boss
1st Spacewalk by US Woman
Jon Gero
Dan Deslover
Dan Deslover
GOES Image
for
11 October 1984
Thanks to Jerry Robiadek and Janean Hill
Johannes Loschnigg
Senior Policy Analyst at
the White House
Office of Science and
Technology Policy
B. SSEC, the Center



General Activities and Health
Administrative Support & Facilities
Tributes, Memories, etc
60
National Weather Association
Annual Meeting Held in Madison
• Over 400 operational meteorologists attended
• Keynote speakers included Tom Skilling, NOAA Chief Scientist Dr. Kathryn
Sullivan, NWS Director Laura Furgione, Dr. Louis Uccellini, and Jon Davis
• Numerous satellite-related presentations from members of CIMSS
• SSEC booth showcased VIIRS imagery from the Direct Broadcast antenna,
as well as demonstrated McIDAS-V and the WMS
• Program committee chaired by Jordan Gerth, Lee Cronce, and Gary Wade,
with widespread support from within CIMSS, SSEC, and ASPB
Hubble HSP Returns to Madison
after 535 Miles up in Space Bob Bless, PI
SSEC People Attending “Opening Night”
Fred Best
Dave Birdsall
Nick Ciganovich
Bob Dombroski
Scott Ellington
Terry Gregory
Bob Herbsleb
Bob Sutton
Tony Wendricks
Now on exhibit at UW Space Place
HSP Was Built at SSEC in 1980’s
Hubble
Integration
at Lockheed
HSP
Optics Bench
Integration
 HSP was removed in 1993 to make
room for the Hubble corrective optics
package.
 It then went into storage at NASA
 With the retirement of the Shuttle,
HSP was released back to UW this
past summer.
HSP
Times, They Are a-Changin’
 Jenny
Hackel is our new Assistant Director
Thank You, Jenny!
 John, our truly amazing Executive Director for
Administration as been able to go to 60%
(Tues-Thurs) and
do some more of the
things he has always
wanted to do
Times, They Are a-Changin’
 Tom Achtor,
our extraordinary Executive Director for
Science, is just as excited about weather, but he now
gets to spend 50% of his time outside the Center
 Wayne Feltz has
assumed many
CIMSS science
Coordination duties
 Jean Phillips chairs
our media group
 Dave Santek leads
McIDAS-V
Thank you all!
Times, They Are a-Changin’
 Fred
Best, our innovative Executive Director for
Technology, is still going at 150%
 Paul
Nipko has retired,
but he left us with a
great new system to
make project management easier—see Fred
Amanda Thornton, Will
Robus, Mark Mulligan
7 June 2012 Meteorite Mystery
Thanks as always
to Fred and his Team!
Times, They Are a-Changin’
 I’m
not ready to hang it up yet, but
 We are all working
to make any
transitions as
smooth as
possible, and
 Thanks to
Mark Mulligan
for helping review
our administrative
structure & needs
SSEC General
And
thanks to all of you
for your commitment to
excellence, innovation,
adaptation, persistence and
for your friendship
It makes the Center work,
and it makes it fun!
SSEC Spending:
Decrease from end of Recovery Act
SSEC Annual Spending (SFY)
Down 6%
but mainly
not labor
(average
increase
over last
13 years
still 6.6 %)
Our mean increase over the last 4 years is still over
5 % and we are not running a deficit—good show all!
69
2012 Spending by Source: ~ $28.9 M
DOD
WARF
Other
2.1% DOE
0.8%
4.0%
8%
NSF
23.1%
NASA
24.2%
NOAA
37.8%
70
SSEC Administrative
Services and Facilities
3rd Floor Admin
 Technical Computing
 Data Center
 McIDAS
 Library
 Public Information & Web Site
 And more (Bricks & Mortar, Safety, Awards, etc)

An Extraordinary support team!
SSEC 3rd Floor Administrative 2012 Highlights
• Human Resources
• 27 new hires and 28 new students
• 30 Visas processed (J1 and H1B)
• 16 PVLs
• 5 retires
• 225 rate and title changes
• 66 ended appointment or graduated
• 168 requests for benefit changes
We are extremely pleased
to have our new
“Dynamic Duo”,
Kate Kaminski and
Denise Weidner
• Purchasing
• 2152 purchases totaling $3.4 million
• Travel
• 915 trips totaling $1 million
• 6172 Electronic TER transactions processed
• New Secure Credit Card payment and Invoicing system
thanks to Debbie Schroeder and Bill Bellon
SSEC 3rd Floor Administrative 2012 Highlights
• Proposals processed in FY 2012
• 147 new proposals processed ($67.5 mil)
• 80 awarded or in negotiations
• 46 pending
• 79% return so far!
• And soon to be in Beta:
• Proposal Builder with Budget Builder
• Monthly Progress Reporting
• Project Management Reports
• Online Inventory
• Excel and CSV Exporting of
online accounting data
Thanks especially to Paul Nipko,
Amanda Thornton, Will Robus,
Mark Mulligan, and Fred Best
2012 Technical Computing
(TC) Highlights
• User Requests: 3363 resolved 400
• Infrastructure:
– Windows Central fileservers moved to a
redundant system (2 servers)
– 10 Gbyte ethernet upgrade for campus
connection, building backbone links, &
some high capacity servers
(big improvement in throughput)
SSEC Firewall Upgrade
The recent SSEC firewall upgrade addressed a performance problem.
This problem caused increased packet loss, and in turn poor
throughput for remote high-bandwidth links such as our partners
at NASA and NOAA.
Increasing packet loss trend
Firewall replacement,
decreasing error rate.
SSEC Firewall Upgrade
Results look positive so far, the next several months will make it clearer.
Firewall replacement,
decreasing error rate.
S4 Compute Cluster
• 1561.8 compute years of processing
• TC Produced an information Poster/booth on JCSDA
supercomputing for the JCSDA 10th Workshop on Satellite
Data Assimilation
• At workshop, S4 administration team met with users to discuss
support and new possibilities and challenges
Synthetic GOES-R ABI 8.5 µm Tb
2-km WRF
model
simulation
Jason Otkin &
Agnes Lim
destructive flood event over
Beijing, China on 21 July 2012.
SSEC Data Center
Highlights
2012
• GOES Data
•Infrastructure
GOES-14 1-minute imaging
• SSEC Data Center
served several
users, including
NOAA
• SSEC data used
in National archive
--NOAA unable
to capture for
the archive
11 simultaneous GEO satellites!
A first: received, served real time & archived
COMS
(S. Korea)
AFY2D
(China)
Meteosat-7
(Europe)
Meteosat-9
(Europe)
AFY2E
(China)
GOES-12
GOES-13
GOES-14
MTSAT-1R
(Japan)
Kalpana
(India)
GOES-15
Infrastructure Upgrades
 Completed card access to 6th and 5th floor computer
room facilities
 New cooling in 515
 Updated Data Center Monitors
Computer room access security
4 new APC coolers for 5th
New 52” Displays
Ask to see the Grand Earth View that uses all of them together!
McIDAS Highlights of 2012
Software Updates
McIDAS-V
– Version 1.2 released in April with improved NPP support
and new Jython scripting
– ~400 downloads/month
– ~6,000 uses/month from 600 unique IPs
– 932 members of the User Support Forums
McIDAS-X
– Supported on Enterprise Linux, OS X (soon 10.8), Solaris, Windows
– Added support for Metop-B (launched Sept 2012)
– Added SSH tunneling support for ADDE
MUG membership stable at ~40 sites from 10 countries
– their MUG Membership fees (not overhead) provide the majority
of MUG funding
McIDAS Highlights of 2012
Training and Outreach
Demonstrations
– AMS Annual Meeting
New Orleans LA (January)
– NOAA Satellite Science Week
Kansas City MO (May)
– McIDAS Users’ Group Meeting
Madison WI (May)
– EUMETSAT Meteorological Satellite Conference
Sopot, Poland (September)
– NWA Annual Meeting
Madison WI (October)
– AGU Conference
San Francisco CA (December)
McIDAS Highlights of 2012
Training and Outreach
Training Workshops
– McIDAS-V: Madison WI (May)
McIDAS Users’ Group Meeting
– McIDAS-V: Beijing, China (June)
China Meteorological Administration
- Attended by 48 scientists from 15 countries
– McIDAS-X and –XCD: SSEC (September)
- Users from Cape Canaveral Forecast Facility
…plus countless demonstrations, talks, and training sessions
conducted at SSEC, at conferences, and at other research
institutions
McIDAS Highlights of 2012
McIDAS-V is now used…
– in numerous research projects
– in the NOAA Environmental Visualization Lab
– in Satellite Meteorology classes
• Mississippi State
• University of Wisconsin
– in international workshops on multi-spectral data
• EUMETSAT/CIMSS “International Summer School on
Applications with the Newest Multi-spectral Environmental
Satellites” - Bracciano, Italy (June)
• WMO “International Training Course on Applications in
Satellite Meteorology” – Beijing, China (June)
THANK YOU to everyone at SSEC for using & promoting
the McIDAS software packages to colleagues around the
world.
We really appreciate it!
Derecho Study
NSF’s EarthCube:
An Envisioned Network of Data and Tools
for the Earth Sciences
SSEC’s Initial and Continuing
Involvement
Wiegand Dec. 2012
SSEC Initial Papers (October 2011)
• An EarthCube Technical Solution: the VisAD Data
Model by Bill Hibbard, Dave Fulker, Tom Whittaker,
and Hank Revercomb
(The above paper was submitted jointly by SSEC and OPeNDAP. It
is one of three Technical Solution papers from SSEC. )
• Earth Cube Technical Solution Paper - Semantic
Framework for the EarthCube Cyberinfrastructure
by Nancy Wiegand, Hank Revercomb
• SSEC Open Geospatial Consortium Initiative
by Sam Batzli
Wiegand Dec. 2012
Further and Ongoing Work
• Semantics for Earth Science Data by Nancy Wiegand
with Robert Raskin (JPL) and Deborah McGuinness (RPI)
• Participation by N. Wiegand in the Semantics and
Ontologies EarthCube community group activities
– Semantics Workshop, April 2012
– NSF Charrette, June 2012
– Roadmap for Creating the Semantic/Ontologic
Infrastructure for the Geosciences
(http://earthcube.ning.com/group/semantics-and-ontologies)
Wiegand Dec. 2012
Education Highlights: Curricular Support
• Designed and taught a dozen-plus workshops for AOS students covering
best resources, techniques, key databases, and citation managers that are
important for effectively searching the literature of the atmospheric and
oceanic sciences and managing results.
• Fall 2012: Proposed, tested and evaluated Mendeley (reference manager
and academic social network tool) for AOS 900 and AOS 171 to encourage
research collaboration and information sharing among library staff, faculty
and students.
• AMS Student Conference 2011 and 2012: developed and led the
WeatherQuest, a program to encourage 500 young scientists to take
advantage of research/information tools via their libraries; network with
each other; take full advantage of the conference program and encourage
future conference attendance.
B. Anderson, L. Hedges, K. Merchant, J.
Phillips
Research Support Highlights
Re-imagining our history to support
current research
Researched, designed, and
developed ‘SSEC Research History’
site to chronicle Center program/
project history. Each of nearly 70
programs included to date features
description of research, SSEC
participation, images, publications,
web sites in chronological,
alphabetical or searchable access
points:
http://library.ssec.wisc.edu/research_History/about
Soon to be launched, we’ll be
seeking your input.
B. Anderson, L. Hedges, K. Merchant, J.
Phillips, T. Achtor, B. Bellon, H. Pi, L. Avila
Research Support Highlights: The Early Years
Researched, designed, developed and published multiple formats of interactive timeline of SSEC’s 50+ year
B. Anderson, L. Hedges, K. Merchant, J.
history in satellite meteorology.
Phillips
Research Support Highlights
The visual display of data and
information gathered from
experiments is a critical element of
research in the atmospheric sciences
and remote sensing disciplines.
Featured on the Library’s YouTube
site are historical films from our
collection. Soon to come – the first
McIDAS demo at AMS and
educational modules on cryogenesis,
tropical cyclones, and more.
Most popular to date: First Color
Movie of the Planet Earth Viewed
from 22,300 Miles Over Brazil with
more than 1000 views.
B. Anderson, L. Hedges, K. Merchant, J.
Phillips
Supporting institutional memory, learning, research and knowledge creation.
Here are a handful of your question topics from this past year:
• Information about Rossby
waves before they were called
Rossby waves
• Historical tide gauge data for
other countries for current
storm water analysis
• Navigating the requirements
for dissertations/theses
• Intellectual
property/copyright/data
citation/data management
guidance and standards
• Work with internal and
external authors
• Tracking the progression of
an idea or concept over time
• Supplying ATS-III images of
Hurricane Camille in 1969 to
NOAA (all 300 of them)
• Climate studies/data for
countries around the world
for various applications
• Pubs analyses for:
permanent residency
applications, CIMSS reports,
proposal support and other
uses
B. Anderson, L. Hedges, K. Merchant, J.
Phillips
SSEC Quality, Safety & Regulatory Program
Staff: Tom Demke & Justin Darrow w/ Fred Best, Mark Mulligan, Paul Nipko & Will Robus
Project Support
Quality
•
•
Reviewed procedures to ensure they are
current
•
•
Staff training database developed
Conducting review of off-the-shelf document
control systems
IDDO
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
DISC Drill/WAIS Divide
Replicate Coring
Intermediate Drill
Hand Augers
Deep Logging Winch
Near Infrared Spectrograph
LiDARs
Safety
•
Continuation Of Operations Plan (COOP)
•
•
•
•
Updated plan & conducted training
Occupant Emergency Plan (OEP)
•
Updated plan
•
AOSS training planned for 2013
CPR/AED/1st Aid Trainings
• 2 completed
Building Safety Inspections
•
Addressed observations
Rev. A, 11/29/12, TAD
Export Control (w/ Ben Griffiths)
•
•
Demke - 50% campus assignment
Conducted multiple trainings (campus)
•
•
Reregistered UW w/ U.S.State Dept.
Submitted 8 EAR licenses (campus)
•
•
Completed 169 ExC visa certifications (campus)
Completed 45 ExC consultations (campus)
•
•
Completed 59 ExC project assessments (SSEC)
Developed campus project assessment tool
•
•
Plan to implement in 2013
Updated campus website
SSEC Media Team Website Highlights
(Tom Achtor, Leanne Avila, Bill Bellon, Mark Hobson, Jean Phillips, and Hsuan-Yun Pi)
• New SSEC Website Design
which includes a new WordPress-based news blog, social media integration
(Facebook, Youtube, RSS …), dynamic home page widgets and more
• New OSSE Website Design
• Overlay capability added to JAVA animation tool, JSani
• Continued website support for numerous SSEC/CIMSS projects
SSEC Media Team Document Highlights
(Tom Achtor, Leanne Avila, Bill Bellon, Mark Hobson, Jean Phillips, and Hsuan-Yun Pi)
Media Team members also promote the center &our research
• New SSEC Metrics Document (quantifying what we do).
• Through the Atmosphere newsletter: The latest featuring
Suomi NPP.
• Research and write SSEC home page articles.
• Help edit and produce proposals and reports
 CIMSS Cooperative Agreement report -- which this year
came to nearly 300 pages!
 International TOVS Working Group report
(another nearly 150 pages!)
• Edit numerous manuscripts that scientists are preparing to
submit to journals.
And coming next year:
a new SSEC Booklet!
Getting the Word Out
Mark Hobson
Featured Stories of 2012:
“Black Marble” images from Suomi NPP
Predictions of Hurricane Sandy
Spectacular new images of Uranus
GlobalHawk carries S-HIS into hurricane
SSEC erects satellite dish in Hawaii
Record-breaking season in Antarctic
Media Exposure:
The High-Speed Photometer, designed
and built by UW-Madison’s Space
Astronomy Laboratory and SSEC, was
one of the original five instrument
packages aboard the Hubble orbiting
telescope. It returned to Earth as an
exhibit at the Space Place.
“Hawk Cam” an International Success
160+ mentions of SSEC/CIMSS in national and
international publications.
Interviews of SSEC/CIMSS personnel:
Jim Kossin – The Weather Channel
Chris Velden – Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, NPR, WISN
(Milwaukee), Daily Cardinal, WORT
Steve Ackerman – Inside Science TV
Tim Schmit – Space News
Colleen Mouw – NASA Earth Observatory
Wayne Feltz – Christian Science Monitor
Sanjay Limaye – WKOW, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Over 1,000 students visit the building to
view the 3D Globe, the AMRC, and the
view of the satellite dish
farm on the roof.
Bricks and
Mortar
Building is now caulked
and sound
World View on 4th
Before SSEC
SSEC Work
Conference
Degree
Visitor Home
Jannine
JoAnn Banks
You’ve touched everyone of us in all that you have done.
Thank You!
Leo Skille 1928-2012
One of the original Electrical Technicians hired by Vern
Suomi and later SSEC Building Manager
34 years at SSEC!
In memory of Suzanne Wetzel Seemann
Suzanne (Suzie) Wetzel Seemann died September 27, 2012 in an accident during a
morning run with friends.
During her research career at UW from 2000 to 2006:
*
She developed an ingredients-based methodology for
forecasting winter season precipitation used by many NWS
Forecast Offices in snowfall prediction
*
She was the lead developer of the UW Baseline Fit Emissivity
Database (Seemann et al. 2008, JAMC) and the MODIS
Atmospheric Profile Algorithm (Seemann et al 2003)
*
She was a devoted mother, well respected scientist,
talented teacher, skilled woodworker, and
lover of nature.
We are very lucky to have known and worked with her.
She will be sorely missed by all of us.
Jim Knickmeyer
Jim had uncommon, common sense
and expertise;
spirit and enthusiasm;
and commitment to friends
He certainly helped us at SSEC
through some hard times
Honors and Awards
Professor Verner Suomi The National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite
system Preparatory Project (NPP) satellite was renamed “Suomi NPP – the Suomi National
Polar-orbiting Partnership” by NASA.
Christopher Velden received the UW Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Research.
Steven Ackerman named UW-Madison Associate Dean for the Physical Sciences
Mathew Gunshor, Anthony J. Schreiner, James P. Nelson III, Scott Bachmeier, Dave
Stettner, Steve Wanzong, Christopher C. Schmidt, Wayne Feltz, Justin Sieglaff, William
Straka, Christopher Velden, and the SSEC Data Center received NOAA-CIMSS
Collaborations Awards.
UW-Madison CIMSS received the Space Shuttle Program Commendation from John P.
Shannon, Space Shuttle Program Manager.
Steven Ackerman/CIMSS received a certificate from the National Weather Service
Spaceflight Meteorology Group for the use of MODIS imagery to support NASA’s human
spaceflight program.
Honors and Awards
Bryan Baum, Rich Frey, Tommy Jasmin, Hank Revercomb, Tom Rink, Dave Tobin, Xuanji
Wang received NASA/NOAA Certificate of Recognition for work connected with Suomi NPP.
Bill Hibbard received the Singularity Institute’s Turing Prize for Best AGI Safety Paper at the
5th Conference on Artificial General Intelligence at Oxford University.
SSEC received a certificate from the National Weather Service Spaceflight Meteorology
Group to recognize the contributions of McIDAS for the past 25 years.
Tommy Jasmin named chair of the Earth Science Information Partners Geospatial
Committee.
Graeme Martin and Dave Tobin received “Best Poster” awards at the International TOVS
Study Conference in Toulouse, France.
William Line received 1st Place Poster Presentation, Graduate Student category, NWA 2012.
Jacola Roman named best Student Oral Presentation, AMS 2012.
Equity and Diversity Committee
Mission Statement:
Members:
• Claire Pettersen – Chair
• Tom Demke
• Mat Gunshor
• Yinghui Lui
• Margaret Mooney
• Maria Vasys
• Linda Hedges (July 2012)
• Jay Heinzelman (July 2012)
• Joey Snarski (July 2012)
• Student Representative
Liaisons:
• Eric Thompson
• Graduate School E&D
• Kate Kaminski
• SSEC HR
• Denny Hackel
• ASEC
“The mission of the Equity and Diversity (E&D) Committee is to provide leadership and
guidance to assist the Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC) Directors as they
integrate equity and diversity initiatives into the work environment.”
2012 Accomplishments:
• Helped initiate a AOSS Building Tour with Mark Hobson
• Started an anonymous “Suggestion Box” located on 4th
floor near the break room, example suggestions include:
• World Map on 4th Floor
• Office cubicle maps
• Working with new HR staff
• New employee orientation suggestions
• Job announcement placement
• Attracting a diverse pool of applicants
• Updates to monthly internal SSEC newsletter
Future Goals:
• Mentoring program within the center
• We are seeking a new member – please join E&D!
• We encourage suggestions from the SSEC community –
please email us your ideas or use the Suggestion Box!
The Second Annual AOSS building-wide poster reception held at Union South was again a big hit.
There were 96 posters, 6 demonstrations, and over 200 people in attendance. It was a great time
and we are planning the Third Annual AOSS Poster Reception for the Spring of 2013.
Thanks to the AOSS Poster Committee for putting on a great event:
Claire Pettersen – Committee Chair/SSEC, Ankur Desai – AOS/CCR, Maria Vasys – SSEC/CIMSS, Bill Bellon – SSEC,
Britta Gjermo – AOS, Mat Gunshor – SSEC/CIMSS, Linda Hedges – Schwerdtfeger Library, Mark Kulie – SSEC,
Jean Phillips – Schwerdtfeger Library, Eric Thompson – SSEC
Plans for New SSEC Mobile Atmospheric Measurement Capability
AERIbago (1996 – 2012)
 The AERIbago is 16 years old and
showing signs of age.
 Since coming on-line in 1996 we
have supported numerous field
experiments all across the country.
 The original system had capability
for an Atmospheric Emitted
Radiance Interferometer (AERI)
and a radiosonde system.
 The new mobile system will be housed
in a trailer, towed by a Ford F 350.
 The instrument complement will
include:






AERI
HSRL (lidar)
Radiosonde System
Office Space
Met Tower (T, RH, P, Wind)
Future Possibilities: Total Precip. Water
GPS, Microwave Radiometers, All Sky
Camera, Small Radar
New Trailer Expected in Spring of 2013
Layout of New Trailer
Instrument Section
(AERI, HSRL, Others)
Office Space
More Instruments &
Generator
Workable Interior Space is Close to Original AERIbago
FIRST LIFTOFF
The HawkCam website attracted over 600,000 visitors.
At its peak, the video stream had over 2,000 simultaneous viewers,
generating nearly 4.0 Gbps in traffic (which is why we had to move
the video feed to a SSEC-owned server in DoIT's data center)
C. Education and Public
Outreach (EPO)






Earth Science Education
EarthNow-Science on a Sphere
VISITview TeleTraining
CIMSS Satellite Blog
International Remote Sensing
Courses
Office of Space Science Education
(OSSE): Solar system missions
115
CIMSS iPad Library & ESIP Teacher Workshops
In 2012 CIMSS launched a new initiative to engage teachers and students in data
acquisition and regional climate studies. The CIMSS iPad Library, managed by the
Schwerdtfeger Library, loans iPads to science teachers for an entire school year!
The first units were distributed at the Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) Teacher
Workshop where educators learned about climate-related Apps, including SatCam,
where users collect observations of cloud and surface conditions coordinated with an
overpass of the Terra, Aqua, or Suomi NPP satellite.
The CIMSS iPad Library
is funded by NASA
ESIP teacher workshops
are funded by NOAA
Margaret Mooney, Steve Ackerman, Patrick Rowley
With thanks to Jenny Hackel, Jean Phillips, Endre Doeringsfeld & many others
CIMSS iPad Library & ESIP Teacher Workshops
In 2012 CIMSS launched a new initiative to engage teachers and students in data
acquisition and regional climate studies. The CIMSS iPad Library, managed by the
Schwerdtfeger Library, loans iPads to science teachers for an entire school year!
The first units were distributed at the Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) Teacher
Workshop where educators learned about climate-related Apps, including SatCam,
Steve announced
yesterday
where users collect observations
of cloud and surface
conditions coordinated with an
overpass of the Terra, Aqua, or Suomi NPP satellite.
that a new
CIMSS Education and
Outreach Office
has been established,
headed by
Margaret Mooney
The CIMSS iPad Library
is funded by NASA
ESIP teacher workshops
are funded by NOAA
Margaret Mooney, Steve Ackerman, Patrick Rowley
With thanks to Jenny Hackel, Jean Phillips, Endre Doeringsfeld & many others
Teaching Climate Change STEM courses in Alaska
NSSL’s Bob Rabin introduced North Slope Alaska Native students
from Barrow, Alaska, and other small villages to weather and climate
science through two STEM courses held on the campus of the Ilisagvik
College.
GOES Visible
Can give very
useful coverage
as far north
as Alaska—
even showing
sea ice off
Barrow
Bob Rabin
EarthNow • 2012
• Datasets for Science on a Sphere (SOS)
created at CIMSS in collaboration with
CICS-MD, CPC, & NCDC – 2+ posts
monthly
• New this fall, the EarthNow website
added video summaries with
professionally-recorded narrations.
• The audio adds enhanced capability for
museums to use datasets without “live”
docent-led presentations
• Videos with audio allow for a broader
EarthNow audience, beyond NOAA’s
Science On a Sphere museum network.
• Increased social media presence
• Large presence at 2012 SOS Network
Meeting (“’Rockstar’ of the conference”
– NOAA OED)
Patrick Rowley, Margaret Mooney, Steve Ackerman, Rick Kohrs
With many thanks to Tommy Jasmin, Bill Bellon, and many others
http://sphere.ssec.wisc.edu/
Virtual Institute for Satellite Integration Training
(VISIT)
Three new or revised training modules
for National Weather Service forecasters
Training focus increased to include GOES-R
products developed at CIMSS
36 live teletrainings and 10 ‘Satellite Chats’
Scott Lindstrom, Scott Bachmeier
CIMSS Satellite Blog
Scott Bachmeier &
Scott Lindstrom
185 blog posts since
1 December 2011
#1!!
CIMSS BLOG Memory Usage
12000
M
e 10000
g 8000
a
b 6000
y
4000
t
e 2000
s
0
1
2
3
4
5
2005-2012
6
7
8
http://fusedfog.blogspot.com
Blog started on
7/11/2012 to catalog
training examples for
GOES-R
Fog Product
70+ entries (and
growing!)
50-100 page views
daily; 9500+ page
hits so far
(Scott Lindstrom,
Corey Calvert, Mike
Pavolonis)
International Remote Sensing Courses Continue
lectures & labs explore high spatial resolution vis / IR data,
high spectral resolution IR data, and MW soundings (from VIIRS, CrIS, & ATMS)
Perth - Jan 2012, Melbourne - Feb 2012, Bologna – May 2012,
Potenza – Jun 2012, Jincheon – Oct 2012
Tom Rink evolves HYDRA to enable inspection of Suomi NPP data
WMO RAII Training Event in Jincheon, Korea
4-6 Oct 2012
Attendees from 19 countries heard lectures by Jim Purdom and Paul Menzel
Allen Huang and Paul Menzel attend conference
and give talks
Korean COMS is providing
meteorological and oceanographic data
since launch in June 2010
Advanced imagers planned
for Korean and Japanese and geo sats
Advanced sounder planned for
Chinese geo sats
CIMSS continues strong collaborations with
Asia Oceania Satellite Community
OSSE Highlights 2012
Venus Express Education & Public Outreach
• OSSE continues emphasis on
Teacher Training for Venus
Express Classroom Resources
• New Partnership with ESA
resulting in two workshops in
Spain & the Netherlands in
2012:
– Over fifty teachers
representing eighteen
countries trained to use our
Venus Winds products!
– Expanded upon Venus
Cloud Tracking activity for
an authentic Student
Research Experience
– One hundred teachers on
waiting list for 2013!!
OSSE Highlights 2012
OSIRIS-REx: NASA New Frontiers Asteroid Sample Return Mission
• OSSE supports
evaluation/design of overall
Education and Public
Outreach Program for
University of Arizona and
NASA Goddard.
• Successfully Designed “Name
that Asteroid” campaign for
The Planetary Society.
• Completed development of
“Target Asteroid,” amateur
astronomy observer program
• PDR scheduled for April 2013!
D. Our Science & Engineering
What we do can be divided into “to…



Observe
Analyze
Apply
129
To Observe
1)
Suomi NPP Cal/Val Inter-comparisons
2)
Technologies for Climate Benchmark
(CLARREO)
3)
EV-1 Hurricane Mission: Science Flights
4)
Ice Coring & Drilling Record, etc.
5)
Antarctic Meteorology Research
6)
Greenland ICECAPS Experiment
7)
NIR Instrument for SALT Telescope
8)
High Spectral Resolution Lidar
130
Simultaneous “Nadir” Overpasses (SNOs)
for comparing CrIS, IASI, and AIRS
Tobin “Big Circle” Approach
Well Understood Sampling Errors
Sum of
Gaussians
100 km
CrIS AIRS, Feb-Nov
Selected Overpasses
 t < 20 min
view  < 30
 < 3
±73: 9:30-13:30 SNOs
CrIS IASI, Feb-Nov
Example CrIS-IASI & CrIS-AIRS
Northern CrIS Spectra
±0.5 K
error bars
Dave Tobin
Suomi-NPP VIIRS
VIIRS image quality is excellent
Band
M1
(412nm)
3/4/2012
NASA climate follow-on mission to MODIS
UW Goals: VIIRS SDR performance (Cal/Val). Spectral Cal lead.
Participants: Moeller, LaPorte, Menzel; Funding: NASA, JPSS
Sharp coastal boundaries
Striping not evident
S-NPP VIIRS Status/Milestones in 2012
•
•
LWIR VIIRS agree within 0.1 K with CrIS, IASI
Mean: -0.03K
STD: 0.06K
M15 (10.8um)
•
Mean: -0.03K
STD: 0.27K
M15 (10.8um)
VIIRS biases minimized under ambient OBC ops
First light for S/M/LWIR in Jan 2012 (VisNIR: Nov 2011)
SDR “Provisional Status” anticipated Dec 2012
(high but not optimal product quality).
Performance elements nominal, with few exceptions:

Detector / mirror-side striping almost non-existent.

Anticipated cross talk (from pre-launch tests) in
VisNIR appears to be minimal.

Close agreement in radiometric comparisons to
CrIS and to IASI for TEB. Bias shows some
scene temperature dependence in M14-M16.

Anomalous RTA mirror darkening (tungsten) in
VisNIR mitigated thru calibration updates. No
negative impact anticipated during VIIRS lifetime.

At-launch spectral response updated to better
reflect on-orbit performance.
Anticipated 2013 Milestones/Activities
•
•
•
Update VisNIR and SWIR spectral response to reflect
mirror darkening influence.
Achieve validation status for VIIRS SDR product
(aircraft underflights, satellite comparisons).
JPSS-1 pre-launch test program begins.
Collection 6 MOD07 Atmospheric Profile Products
Eva Borbas
Algorithm has been delivered and the products are available at
http://ladsweb.nascom.nasa.gov
Band
Main updates:
•
•
•
Forward Model Update (CRTM V2.0.2 / ODPS).
H2O/CO2/O3 spectral band SRF shifts as suggested by IASI-MODIS
comparison study (Tobin, Moeller, Quinn et al.) were implemented
in the FM calculation to reduce TPW and TOZ biases
Terra MODIS IR channels showed strong warm BT biases in
cold cases, which have been corrected by adjustment of the
calibration offset coefficients.
April 14 2007 at 09:50 UTC
Terra/MODIS with shift
Terra Shift
(cm-1)
Aqua Shift
(cm-1)
27
(H2O)
4
5
28
(H2O)
2
2
30 (O3)
1
0
34 (CO2)
0.8
0.8
35 (CO2)
0.8
0.8
36 (CO2)
1
1
The impact of the Terra H2O/CO2/O3 band spectral shifts on MOD07 TOZ over Budapest, HU
for 2007: Comparison with ground-based Brewer Spectrophotometer measurements
Budapest, HU
No shift
With shift
Results were provided by Dr. Aniko Kern, Eotvos Lorand University, Budapest, HU
Validation of Sounder
UTLS temperature using
GPS RO: Experience with
AIRS and COSMIC
Bob Knuteson, Michelle Feltz, Jacola Roman
• ARM sondes
verify GPS RO
vertical structure
• AIRS vertical
resolution limits
ability to resolve
fine structure.
Tropopause
COSMIC
Tdry
Moisture
Error
COSMIC/AIRS/ARM Sonde Profile
NASA Technology Development
for Climate Benchmark Measurements
Nick Preparing Vacuum Chamber
Absolute
Radiance
Interferometer
Fore-optics
Interferometer
Aft Optics
Detectors
Calibration Blackbodies
Scene Mirror
UW SSEC teamed with Harvard, successfully
increased the Technical Readiness Level (toward a
spaceflight mission) of six technologies needed to
make Climate Benchmark measurements.
Additional funding has been allocated by NASA to
further test these technologies in a vacuum
chamber – simulating on-orbit conditions.
UW IIP Technology Development
Miniature Phase Change Cell (MPCC)
Integration of MPCC into Breadboard
Blackbody for Thermal Testing
MPCC Component Integration,
Characterization and Accelerated Life Testing
Heated Halo Generation-2 (Large Conical
Halo, AERI BB with ARI Breadboard FTIR)
On-Orbit Absolute Radiance Standard:
New 30 mm Aperture BB with MPCC
integrated into cavity, and Heated Halo
Heated Halo Generation-1 (Breadboard Halo,
AERI BB with Scanning HIS Aircraft FTIR)
Absolute Radiance Interferometer (ARI) Breadboard
TRL 4
Absolute Radiance Interferometer Prototype
TRL 5
ARI Prototype with OARS, including Heated Halo
TRL 6
Slide 138
UW Phase Change Demonstration on ISS
ISS Demonstration Hardware
Integrated assembly
under laboratory testing
1 cm
Melt block
with phase
change cells
Flight expected sometime next year
ISS Demo Melt Materials
3 different melt materials will be demonstrated in the
microgravity environment of the ISS
Melt Cycle
Gallium Melt
40
30.4
30.3
Temperature (C)
Gallium
30
Gallium-Tin
30.2
30.1
30
29.9
29.8
29.6
40000
41000
42000
43000
44000
45000
28000
29000
30000
13000
14000
15000
Time (sec)
10
GaSn Melt
Water
20.9
20.8
Temperature (C)
Temperature (C)
29.7
20
0
20.7
20.6
20.5
20.4
20.3
-10
20.2
20.1
25000
26000
27000
Time (sec)
-20
0
10000
20000
30000
40000
50000
Water Melt
0.4
Time (sec)
Temperature (C)
0.3
Example of the UW-SSEC Phase Change Cell Demonstration running through
all three melts continuously – first water, then gallium-tin, then gallium. As
shown at right, the melt signature is well-resolved for each material to high
accuracy (±5mK). While on board the ISS, the demonstration will run many
sequences of melts with several different melt lengths and these will be
compared to measurements obtained on the ground.
0.2
0.1
0
-0.1
-0.2
-0.3
-0.4
10000
11000
12000
Time (sec)
Hurricane and Severe Storm Sentinel (HS3)
NASA Earth Venture 1 Mission
Scott Braun, GSFC, PI
142
Product Support for the Hurricane and Severe Storm
Sentinel (HS3) Field Program Chris Velden
Focused Research
Goal: To utilize the HS3 observations
along with the CIMSS satellitederived products to document the
upper-tropospheric conditions during
TCs and better understand how they
can modulate intensity changes.
ABOVE: Sample of other selected real time CIMSS
products provided to the HS3 operations and
forecasting center. Top Left: CIMSS shear analysis.
Top Right: ASCAT winds. Bottom Left: TPW image.
Bottom Right: Dry air (Saharan Air Layer) product.
ABOVE: SSMIS microwave (54.4GHz)
warm core analysis from TC Nadine.
The “Environmental” GH
Airborne Vertical
Atmospheric
Profiling System
(AVAPS)
Scanning High
Resolution Infrared
Sounder (S-HIS)
Cloud Physics Lidar
(CPL)
Upwelling thermal radiation at
high spectral resolution between
3.3 and 18 microns.
532/1064 nm Lidar Reflection
89 Dropsondes / flight
Temperature, Pressure,
wind, humidity vertical
profiles
NOAA, NCAR
Temperature, water vapor
vertical profiles
U of Wisconsin, SSEC
Cloud structure and depth
NASA GSFC
The “Over-Storm” GH
High Altitude Imaging
Wind and Rain
Airborne Profiler
(HIWRAP)
High Altitude
Monolithic Microwave
integrated Circuit
Sounding Radiometer
(HAMSR)
4 C-band Microwave emission
Cross-track swath coverage
Ku/Ka band Radar reflectivity
30/40 Conical scan
Microwave coss-track Sounder
25 Microwave channels-50,118,183 GHz
Surface Wind Speed, Rain
Rate
3-D Winds and Precipitation
Temperature, Water Profiles,
Cloud Liquid Water, Rain Rate, IWP
Hurricane
Imaging
Radiometer
(HIRad)
NASA MSFC
NASA GSFC
JPL
Global Hawk view:
Chincoteague & Assateague near NASA Wallops
S-HIS operated well on HS3 Global Hawk
Scanning HIS
147
HS3 Explores Nadine’s Interaction
With the SAL
Date: September 11-12
Target: TS Nadine
Goal: Examine whether
SAL air is getting into
Nadine’s circulation and
perhaps slowing its
development
Dust
Tropical
Storm
Nadine
Sample data from the
Cloud Physics Lidar
SAL dust
S-HIS on 2012 HS3: Significant real time feedback for 1st time!
Engineering and Radiance
data example
900 cm-1 Tb Map
Payload & Pilot trailers
With reliable KU, Real-Time
dual regression retrievals
served Payload Trailer
with 40 to 45 second latency!!
Elise Garns
CrIS/AIRS Underflight
Promising
S-HIS/CrIS
comparison
Global hawk Flight Track
151
IDDO Ice Drilling & Operations
Charlie Bentley, Don Lebar, and their large, impressively talented team
• WAIS Divide Ice Main Core Competed 12/31/11, Culmination of 10 yr effort
• Excellent quality core over 3,405 m depth, even in technically challenging
warm ice
• 1st high-resolution southern hemisphere record of greenhouse gases and
climate comparable to the Greenland records
• Will contribute significantly to improved understanding of climate variability
over the last ~ 65,000 years
Drilling team
Spooling on the new 4,200 m cable
Ice core in DISC Drill
DISC Drill Replicate Coring: Maiden voyage at WAIS Divide
 Challenging and enlightening: IDDO engineers gained a great deal of insight
into the process of creating a deviation for replicate coring
 New borehole camera proved valuable in assessing the results of the
deviation effort
 Root cause of problems determined from design and fabrication of a
sophisticated test set-up
 Tests were conducted to simulate a “sonde-in-the-borehole” to determine
drill sonde deflection, to verify the mechanical system analyses and to
measure force at the cutter head for given set points.
 Drill team now getting ready for a test at pole
Borehole
camera
Milling head with cutters
Replicate Coring system testing at IDDO
DISC Drill Replicate Coring: Progress from the pole
 Logging Tool Tests: Successfully navigating
the deviation needed for replicate drilling,
the dummy logging tool passed its test
2 days ago
—see hole photos below
Deviation at 2 km depth!
Drilling completed at Taylor Glacier, Antarctica for study of ancient atmospheres
Using the Blue Ice (Large Diameter) Drill developed by IDDO, an IDDO
contract driller successfully completed drilling for samples dedicated to the study
of ancient atmospheric composition. Approximately 1,000 meters of high quality,
large (9.5-inch diameter) ice core was recovered.
Abundance of ice cores at Taylor Glacier
Rapid Access Ice Drill (RAID) for interdisciplinary science
 Concept for a unique drill capable of
1) drilling through 3.3 km of ice,
2) retrieving ice core samples at selected depths during the drilling process, and
3) coring up to 25 m of rock beneath the ice was developed
 Community planning meetings among IDDO, industry, and logistics support
representatives came to consensus on science requirements and features
 Conceptual Deign produced by IDDO, along with preliminary schedules/budgets
 Mineral-exploration industry “diamond-drilling” rig is basis for design
Suitable model of mobile deep-drilling rig
Easily portable drills of various kinds enabled successful science
 IDDO Portable Hot Water Drill allowed one geophysicist and his field team
to obtain over 9 km of high-quality seismic data
 Over 280 shot holes drilled by another group using the same drill
 Other Drills: 6 PICO hand augers, 3 SIPRE augers and 2
Sidewinder systems were utilized by science teams in Antarctica.
Portable Hot Water Drilling on Whillans Ice Stream
Intermediate Depth Drill Starts Taking Shape
IDDO made progress in design and procurement of major subsystems of the new
Intermediate Depth Drill (IDD). Based on the Danish Hans Tausen drill and deep coring drills,
the IDD will be capable of collecting ice cores to depths of 1,500 m. IDDO is cooperating with
the Centre for Ice and Climate in Copenhagen and Victoria University of Wellington’s Antarctic
Research Centre in modifying and upgrading designs. This drill will serve a great need in the
ice coring community. It is scheduled for testing in the summer of 2014 in Greenland and for
deployment for a science project in Antarctica during the 2014-15 field season.
Winch
New IDD Winch and
Tower design
New IDD Anti-Torque design
30 Years of
Automatic
Weather Stations
in Antarctica
• Article in Oct. 2012
Bulletin of the
American
Meteorological Society
• Comprehensive paper
on the history of
Automatic Weather
Stations in Antarctica
20 Years: Antarctic Meteorological Research Center
• 30 October 1992 – 30 October 2012
• Satellite composites & Observational meteorology
South Pole
Climatology
• A comprehensive 50 year
surface climatology
study!
• Results
– Not statistically
significant:
• Temperature slight
decrease
• Shorter winters…
– Significant:
• Mean Wind Speeds
decreasing
• Maximum Wind Speeds
increasing
• Snow accumulation
decreasing
AMRC – Observational Research
ICECAPS: Integrated Characterization of Energy, Clouds,
Atmospheric state, and Precipitation at Summit, Greenland
PIs: Ralf Bennartz (University of Wisconsin), Matthew Shupe (University of Colorado),
Dave Turner (NOAA), and Von Walden (University of Idaho)
Instrumentation
Science
All Greenland Melt Event
ICECAPS Mobile Science Facility – Summit, Greenland (Shupe, BAMS 2012)
SSEC:
Ralf Bennartz – PI/Scientist
Mark Kulie – Scientist
Aronne Merrelli – Summer Phase 2011
Nate Miller – Summer Phase 2011
Erik Olson – Engineer
Claire Pettersen – Winter Phase III 2012
July 2012 Greenland Ice Sheet Melt Event as seen by ICECAPS (Miller, AGU
2012)
Science Resource:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/arctic/observatories/summit/browser/
Papers:
Shupe, et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 2012
Miller, et al., Journal of Geophysical Research, 2013
Bennartz, et al., Nature, Submitted
SSEC State of the Center 2012
Robert S Stobie – Near Infrared Spectrograph
for the
Southern African Large Telescope
13 December 2012
SALT
Marsha Wolf
Principal Investigator
Balancing the Baryon
Budget:
Star formation, Gas
accretion, &
Feedback
Near Infrared Spectrograph, NIR
• NIR is a complementary instrument to
the VIS (visible) instrument developed
by the Dept. of Astronomy for the
Southern African Large Telescope
(SALT).
• NIR has a HgCdTe detector sensitive
in the 0.7-1.4 µm range.
• Marsha Wolf has been promoted to
PI. Andrew Sheinis accepted a
position at the Australian Astronomical
Observatory.
• The NIR is in the midst of integrating
and testing. Completion planned for
2013.
• SALT is planning a facility upgrade to
accommodate the NIR in the next 1-2
years.
Project Team:
•
Astronomy
– Marsha Wolf •
– Sam Gabelt
– Kristine
Garot
– Briana Indahl
– Kurt Jaehnig
– Greg Mosby
– Ken
Nordsieck
– Jeff Percival
– Mike Smith
SSEC
– Doug Adler
– Tom Demke
– Ron Koch
– Bill Mason
– Mark
Mulligan
– Paul
Sendelbach
– Don
Thielman
– Mark Werner
– Jeff Wong
Detector Testing
Dewar
Engineering grade detector mounted and installed in the test Dewar for characterization
testing
Mechanisms & Structure
NIR Dewar being
prepped for
environmental testing at 40°C. Must maintain
vacuum and thermally
control detector to 115 K.
These two photos show the integration of the NIR support structure and
mechanisms. The instrument is designed with 14 mechanisms and 10 are
installed. Mechanism control has been developed and tested on 10 mechanisms.
NIR Articulation Mechanism in Motion
The video shows the camera saddle being commanded through its full range of motion.
GV HSRL
NCAR, Costa Rica / Chile, February 2012
GV HSRL
NCAR, Costa Rica / Chile, February 2012
“Arctic” HSRL
Singapore, August 2012
Support of NASA Southeast Asia Composition, Cloud, Climate Coupling
Regional Study (SEAC4RS) surface observation network
Other HSRL Highlights
Laser Control Improvements – Marty Lawson
has had great success in maximizing spectral
purity and stability
BAGO HSRL - Ilya Razenkov is working on adding
temperature profiling
Supporting DOE HSRL’s (Barrow AK, Maldives)
AHSRL Deployment to Norman OK – Spring/Summer
Great Work!
Ed Eloranta, Joe Garcia, Igor Razenkov, Ilya Razenkov,
Marty Lawson, Don Thielman, Paul Sendelbach,
David Smith (Bit 7), Istvan Bocsi (Bit 7)
Great Support!
Will Robus, Paul Schnetteler, Tom Demke, Justin Darrow
Ed’s Lidars
Dual HSRLs
in the
penthouse
25 November 2012
Last of the 21st Century!
Transit
of
Venus
5 June
2012
Historically, gave 1st accurate
size of solar system
And Speaking of Venus
As the chair of VEXAG, the Venus Exploration Analysis Group,
Sanjay Limaye briefs Charles Bolton, NASA Administrator, in DC
on his way to a Venus Express meeting in Europe
To Analyze
1)
Outer Planets
2)
Clouds Properties
3)
Atmosphere PEATE Climate
4)
Boundary layer from lidar
5)
Radiative Transfer
6)
Sounder Studies
7)
Cryosphere
8)
Hazardous Weather Test-bed
participation example
175
2012 Research on Outer-Planet Atmospheres at SSEC
Science Team:
Larry Sromovsky, Pat Fry, Kevin Baines
Planets: Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Uranus
Research:
Atmospheric circulation
Seasonal response
Dynamics of circulation features
Vertical cloud structure and composition
Methane absorption modeling
Techniques:
Spectroscopy, Imaging, in situ observations, cloud tracking,
radiation transfer modeling
Data Sources:: Hubble Space Telescope, Cassini, New Horizons
Ground based telescopes (Keck, IRTF, Gemini).
Archived data from Voyager & Galileo missions.
Uranus: Observing episodic bright spot interaction.
Sromovsky, L.A., H.B. Hammel, I. de Pater, P.M.
Fry, and 13 co-authors. 2012. Episodic bright and
dark spots on Uranus. Icarus 220, 6-22.
2
1
Keck, Nov. 11
Spots spreading apart,
encounter 25 Dec 2011.
Predicted close approach
of two bright spots on 25
Dec 2011 might have
produced an outburst of
bright methane ice clouds.
Instead, a rare small dark
spot and bright companion
were observed in HST
images.
Uranus: Cloud structure and circulation
Sromovsky, L.A., P.M. Fry, H.B. Hammel, I. de Pater, and K.A. Rages. 2012. Post-equinox dynamics and polar
cloud structure on Uranus. Icarus 220, 694-712.
View of North improves 1997 to 2012, revealing many convective features and zonal wind structure
After the 2007 equinox, we got better views of the north polar region of Uranus,
and discovered numerous small “convective” cloud features, allowing us to fill a
big gap in the zonal wind profile, clearly defining a northern prograde jet of 260
m/s near 60o N.
The “convective” north polar features resemble those seen near both poles at
equinox on Saturn, but have only been seen in northern spring on Uranus,
suggesting that seasonal cooling from the top may be promoting convection.
South polar fall
2003
North polar spring
2011
New Uranus
Observations in 2012:
High S/N imaging from
Keck and Gemini in JulyNovember revealed new
weather phenomena in
1
unprecedented
detail.
Most detailed ever images of Uranus from Keck telescope, July 2012
streaky
“cumulus”
scallop
bands
fields
waves
1
DS +
companions
HST STIS spectra (300 1000 nm) were acquired
in September to determine if methane is deleted
in the north polar regions
of Uranus as it was in the
south polar regions; if not,
the depletion is likely
seasonal and may be
connected to a difference
in polar cloud structures.
0
0
o
o
CH4/H2 ratio
constrained by
0.825 micron
feature
In September, Space Telescope Imaging Spectrogaph yielded spectra
for half of Uranus to investigate latitudinal dependence of Methane
SSEC 2012 Outer Planet Research: Getting
Noticed in Discover, Science, Icarus, NASA HDQ
SMD weekly highlights
briefing at NASA/HQ.
Oct 9, 2012
Science Magazine, 26 October 2012 Issue
First Look at Saturn’s Meteorology at Depth
VIMS 5-mm:
RADAR 2-cm: Cloud
Extinction
NH3 Vapor
Extinction
Deep ( ~3 bar) Clouds of NH4SH Hidden Beneath
Ammonia Hazes/Clouds Mapped in Silhouette
against Saturn’s Background Thermal
Radiation. Maps by Cassini/VIMS at 5-mm.
NH3
N>S
Deep (~2-bar) NH3 Humidity Near Tops and Above
NH4SH (Ammonium Hydrosulfide) Clouds Mapped
at 2 cm by Cassini/ RADAR in Passive Mode
Temperature (K):
\
In Image:
VIMS 5 mm: Clearings in clouds: Aqua
Thick clouds: Dark
RADAR 2 cm: Low NH3-humidity: Red
High NH3 Humidity: Dark
Results: Find Both NH3-dry (Red) and
NH3-humid (Dark) NH4SH Clouds
Low NH3
Expected: NH3-Humid Clouds. Updrafts Bring Humid Air
to Form NH4SH Clouds. Since N>S Globally , Some NH3
Remains After all Sulfur Used in Forming NH4SH Clouds
Unexpected: NH3-Dry Air in/above Some NH4SH Clouds
Possible Explanation: NH3 Sequestered in Aqueous
Solution Clouds at 8-20-Bar
Kevin Baines
MODIS Collection 6 Cloud Products
Major software upgrade submitted in 2012
(that Rich Frey guy)
Cloud top height/pressure/temperature and IR
cloud thermodynamic phase will be available at
both 1-km and 5-km resolution (previously only at
5-km resolution) (that Paul Menzel guy)
Collection 6 software includes both calibration and
algorithm updates; also accounts for improved
knowledge of spectral response functions obtained
from AIRS-MODIS radiance comparisons
(that Dave Tobin guy)
In example shown here, the IR cloud phase
algorithm now has much improved capability to
discriminate optically thin cirrus as being “ice”
phase; note that the frequency of the green
(uncertain) color is significantly lower in bottom
panel especially in the higher latitudes
(those Baum/Heidinger/Frey guys)
Product evaluation made extensive use of CALIOPMODIS comparisons (that Bob Holz guy)
Global results – those PEATE guys
Cirrus Optical Depth Biases Resolved
- MODIS single scatter properties modified
- CALIOP Lidar Ratio adjusted
Bob Holz
MODIS Vis vs CALIOP
BEFORE
AFTER
 IR used to identify biases in both MODIS and CALIOP retrievals
 MODIS retrievals reprocessed on UW Atmosphere PEATE with a new single scatter
database (roughened aggregated columns)
 CALIOP algorithm team modified the lidar ratio to better match new MODIS results.
183
Cloud Top Height from VIIRS
Compared to CALIOP
Low Cloud
Overestimation
High Cloud
Underestimation
High Cloud Bias
Bob Holz
Cloud Top Height:
Global 5 deg Gridded Results
IDPS VIIRS - CALIOP (km)
LC High Bias
HC Low Bias
Bob Holz
VIIRS Science Team: Cloud evaluation
Bryan Baum, Elisabeth Weisz, Nadia Smith & Paul Menzel
Evaluating VIIRS IDPS cloud products (cloud top pressure, temperature and phase)
Adopting a multi-instrument approach
SOUNDER + IMAGER: CrIS will be complimentary to VIIRS in that it will give a semitransparency correction for cloud top pressure
Mapping Data into Information: space-time gridding
Nadia Smith, Paul Menzel, Elisabeth Weisz & Bryan Baum
CrIS BT @ 900cm-1; Aug 2012 daytime avg
- Regional to global scale
- Multi-instrument evaluation and combination
- Data filtering and statistical aggregation (standard grid)
- Application/parameter-specific information products
- Long-term, large-scale trend analysis
- Environmental regional change detection
CrIS CTP retrieval: monthly high cloud pressure
Level-1B/2
gridding
Level-3
Smith, N., Menzel, W.P., Weisz, E., Heidinger, A.K. & B.A.Baum (2012) A uniform space-time gridding algorithm for comparison of satellite data products:
characterization and sensitivity study. JAMC (in press), online: http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JAMC-D-12-031.1
Atmosphere PEATE: NPP Processing
Liam Gumley, Bob Holz, Steve Dutcher, Greg Quinn, Bruce Flynn,
Fred Nagle, Min Oo, Ralph Kuehn, Nick Bearson, and Hank Revercomb
Atmosphere PEATE for Suomi NPP
•
•
•
•
We help the NASA Science Team to assess Suomi NPP products.
Have ingested > 500 Terabytes since Nov 2011.
Are distributing > 1 Terabyte per day.
Developed tools to compare Suomi NPP products to EOS, POES,
GOES, and Metop sensors.
• Are running > 10 enhanced product algorithms daily.
MODIS Cloud Optical Thickness 2012-11-21
VIIRS Cloud Optical Thickness 2012-11-21
Atmosphere PEATE Web Resources
http://peate.ssec.wisc.edu/
Data Search and Download
Global Gridded Quicklooks
Convective Boundary Layer Height from CALIOP
R. Kuehn, S. Ackerman, R. Holz, L. Roubert
CALIOP Retrievals
JJA Mean Height (km) [~6 years of data]
Validation case study
CALIOP vs LaRC HSRL
DJF Mean Height (km) [~6 years of data]
Commercial Aircraft BL
AMDAR PBLH retrieval climatology
2006-2011 at Chicago (ORD)
T is for
Tobin
Line absorption
Continuum
Sounding Studies
Regional assimilation and forecasting system development for
tropical cyclone application of satellite data
GDAS/GFS data
GSI/WRF Background &
boundary preprocessing
Conventional obs
data
GSI background
at time t-6 hrs
Radiance obs
data
GSI analysis at
time t-6 hrs
other satellite
DP data
WRF 6 hours
forecast
Bufr conversion
GSI background
at time t
CIMSS SFOV rtv
IMAPP/CSPP
data transfer
Satellite
standard DP
(soundings,
tpw, winds)
Jun Li’s Sounding Group with ASPT –
Tim Schmit Brad Pierce, Andy Heidinger etc.
GSI analysis at
time t
WRF 72 hours
final forecast
WRF
postprocessing
update
update
Diagnosis, plotting
and validation
Data archive
Jinlong Li, Jun Li, Tim Schmit, and Pei Wang
Experiments on hurricane ISAAC (2012)
forecasts – precipitation tendency
Ctrl: 6 hourly ISAAC (2012) track analysis
with conventional data assimilated
all: 6 hourly ISAAC track analysis with both
conventional and satellite data assimilated
Obs: 6 hourly ISAAC track observation
(from NHC)
6 hourly ISAAC track analysis from
22 August to 01 September 2012
Satellite data provide
improvement on track analysis in
earlier stage of ISAAC
Assimilation and forecast experiments for Hurricane Irene (2011) with sounder data
Pei Wang, Jinlong Li, Jun Li and Tim Schmit
Hurricane
Track
GTS – conventional data
AQUA – AMSU on Aqua
Sea level
Pressure
Data are assimilated every 6 hours from 06 UTC August 22 to 00 UTC August 24, 2011 followed
by 48-hour forecasts (WRF regional NWP model with 12 km resolution). Hurricane track (HT)
(left) and central sea level pressure (SLP) root mean square error (RMSE) are calculated
GOES-R legacy atmospheric profile (LAP) algorithm validation with GOES Sounder
1. GOES-R LAP algorithm improves GOES Sounder total precipitable water (TPW) over GFS
2. GOES-R LAP is being transferred for real time GOES Sounder sounding generation
Yong-Keun Lee, Zhenglong Li, Jim Nelson, Jun Li
GFS TPW
GOES-R ALG TPW
from GOES Sounder
TPW (mm)
Mean
RMSE
STD
GFS
0.37
1.98
1.95
GOES-R ALG
0.10
1.66
1.66
GEO advanced IR sounder simulation for regional OSSE
Zhenglong Li, Jason Otkin, Wenguang Bai, Tim Schmit, Todd Schaack, Brad Pierce, Jun Li
Zoom-in of
tropical storm
Resolution = 1 km
Very fine scale features, such as
Individual convective cells are
well identified!
Every 6 minutes
CIMSS Sounding Team Peer-reviewed Publications in 2012
Zheng, J., J. Li , T. Schmit , J. Li , Z. Liu, 2012: Study on the assimilation of atmoshperic temperature and
moisture profiles from the Atmospheric InfraRed Sounder (AIRS) measurements for improving hurricane
forecasts, Journal of Geophysical Research – Atmosphere (submitted)
Yao. Z., J. Li , E. Weisz , A. Heidinger and C.-Y. Liu, 2012: Evaluation of Single Field-of-View Cloud Top
Height Retrievals from Hyperspectral Infrared Sounder Radiances with CloudSat and CALIPSO
measurements, Journal of Geophysical Research – Atmosphere (submitted)
Li, Z., J. Li, Y. Li, Y. Zhang, T. J. Schmit, L. Zhou, M. Goldberg, and W. Paul Menzel, 2012: Determining
Diurnal Variations of Land Surface Emissivity from Geostationary Satellites, Journal of Geophysical
Research – Atmospheres (in press).
Yao, Z., J. Li, H.-J. Han, A. Huang, B. J. Sohn, and P. Zheng, 2012: Asian dust height and infrared optical
depth retrievals over land from hyperspectral longwave infrared radiances, Journal of Geophysical
Research – Atmosphere, 117, D19202, doi:10.1029/2012JD017799.
Li, J., C.-Y. Liu, P. Zhang, and T. J. Schmit, 2012: Applications of Full Spatial Resolution Space-Based
Advanced Infrared Soundings in the Preconvection Environment, Weather and Forecasting, 27, 515 - 524.
Yao Z., J. Li, and Jinlong Li, 2012: Sunglint impact on atmospheric soundings from hyperspectral
resolution infrared radiances, Advances in Atmospheric Sciences, 29, 1 - 9.
Kwon, E.-H., J. Li, Jinlong Li, B. J. Sohn and E. Weisz, 2012: Use of total precipitable water classification of
a priori error and quality control in atmospheric temperature and water vapor sounding retrieval,
Advances in Atmospheric Sciences, 29, 263-273.
Ten years of the UW high spectral resolution global IR land
surface emissivity (UWIREMIS) database Eva Borbas
The UW BF emissivity database is available at:
http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/iremis/
It covers the time from early postlaunch onwards
Terra: Apr 2000 – Sept 2012 / Aqua: Sept 2002– Sept 2012
Collection 4 data will be replaced by Collection 6 in 2013.
Over 160 users are internationally distributed
(Suzanne Seemann)
The UWIREMIS module was implemented into
RTTOV10, available since Jan 2012
Timeseries of anomalies
3.7 μm
00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13
8.3 μm
12.1 μm
Annual cycle
3.7 μm
F M A M
Timeseries of anomalies
00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13
Annual cycle
J
Timeseries of anomalies
Annual cycle
8.3 μm
J
J
A
S
O N D
J
F M A M
12.1 μm
J
J
A
S
O N D
J
F M A M
J
J
A
S
O N D
Does Infrared Land surface emissivity (LSE) diurnally vary?
Zhenglong Li, Jun Li, Yue Li, Timothy J. Schmit, and W. Paul Menzel
SEVIRI LSE diurnal variations
•
The GOES-R ABI LSE algorithm is
applied to SEVIRI
•
LSE diurnal variations are found in all
three window channels, during
different time periods
–
•
Significance: 8.7 um > 10.8 um > 12.0 um
Analysis of radiances observations
from SEVIRI and MODIS/Aqua
confirms the LSE diurnal variations
Li et al. 2012, Determining diurnal variations of land
surface emissivity from geostationary satellites, J.
Geophys. Res., doi:10.1029/2012JD018279
Dual-Regression Retrieval Algorithm
for Hyper-spectral Satellite and Aircraft Sensors
2012 Application Examples
Elisabeth Weisz and William L. Smith Sr.
February 2012 Tornadic Outbreak
CrIS Lifted Index (oC) 7:10 UTC

CrIS, AIRS
HU Field Campaign (April 2012)  IASI, CrIS, AIRS
AIRS Lifted Index (oC) 8:20 UTC
Tornado hits at 10:50
Super-Storm Sandy (Oct 2012)  CrIS, AIRS
Global Hawk HS3 (Sept/Oct 2012)  S-HIS
UW Hyper-Spectral Retrieval Software Package
for AIRS, IASI and CrIS L1 to L2 processing
V1.0 Released under CSPP (Community Software Satellite Package) November 2012
Elisabeth Weisz, William L. Smith Sr., Nadia Smith, Kathy Strabala, Liam Gumley, Allen Huang
 The dual-regression retrieval technique is used to retrieve the
following single FOV products under clear and cloudy
conditions from input direct broadcast or archived AIRS, IASI
and CrIS L1 radiance files:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
atmospheric temperature [K] at 101 pressure levels
atmospheric moisture [g/kg] at 101 pressure levels
atmospheric ozone [ppmv] at 101 pressure levels
atmospheric relative humidity [%] at 101 pressure levels
atmospheric dew point temperature [K] at 101 pressure levels
surface skin temperature [K]
surface emissivity (at full spectrum)
total precipitable water [cm]
precipitable water 1 (900 hPa to surface) [cm]
precipitable water 2 (700 to 900 hPa) [cm]
precipitable water 3 (300 to 700 hPa) [cm]
total ozone amount (vertically integrated) [dobson units]
lifted index [oC]
convective available potential energy [J/kg]
CO2 concentration [ppmv]
cloud top pressure [hPa]
cloud top temperature [K]
cloud optical thickness
effective cloud emissivity
cloud mask (values: 0 clear, 1 cloud)
 Available at http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/cspp/
Bill Smith & Elizabeth Weisz
UWPHYSRET
• Physical retrieval (optimal estimation) for clear sky
high spectral resolution IR data;
• Developed at UW-Madison in collaboration with
EUMETSAT;
• Successfully applied to AIRS, CrIS, IASI, S-HIS;
• Adapted to work with climatological or NWP apriori;
• Based on Optimal Spectral Sampling forward model
(developed at AER);
• Allows for full consistency while inverting data from
different instruments (same apriori, same forward
model);
• Adapted to run on multi-core machines within matlab
or octave.
Paolo Antonelli
T, RH, and cloud retrieval characterization with HS3 data
15-Sep-2012, S-HIS RH cross-sections
Dual Regression (DR)
07-Sept
Clear Sky Comparison
RH over ice
UWPHYSRET
AVAPS
UWPHYSRET
RH over water
15-Sept
DR CTP versus CTT
The Global Cryosphere Watch
Implementation of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO)
Global Cryosphere Watch (GCW) is taking off!
• GCW will provide authoritative, clear, and useable snow
and ice data, information, and analyses on the past,
current and future state of the cryosphere.
• ASPB/CIMSS plays a (co-)leading role in the GCW’s
development and implementation.
• A recent workshop in Vienna helped define the GCW
surface network, called “CryoNet”.
• ASPB/CIMSS is also participating on a WMO Integrated
Global Observing System (WIGOS) task team to
evaluate WMO’s “regulatory material”, i.e.,
measurement standards and practices for snow and ice.
GCW is a legacy of the International Polar Year, a part of the
WMO Integrated Global Observing System (WIGOS), and a
contribution to the Global Earth Observation System of
Systems (GEOSS).
Arctic Report Card 2012 Released
• The NOAA Arctic Report Card for 2012 is now
available at http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/.
•
CIMSS/ASPB scientists contributed to the section
on the atmosphere, specifically on Arctic clouds.
• This peer-reviewed, web-based annual update is
written by an international team of 141 scientists
from 15 countries.
Highlights:
• New record low snow extents seen in
North America and Eurasia.
• Arctic sea ice extent reached an all-time record minimum.
• Tundra is getting greener and growing season length has increased.
• Sea surface temperatures continue to be warmer than the long-term
average at the ice-free margins.
Hazardous Weather Testbed Spring Experiment:
Verification of Model Boundary Layer with GOES
Becky Cintineo and Jason Otkin
Investigating performance of PBL and microphysics schemes by comparing
simulated brightness temperatures from CAPS WRF-ARW ensemble against
observed GOES-13 brightness temperatures
Forecast minus observation
Observed
Frequency Distribution
Thompson
M-Y
Morrison
WDM6
GOES-13 11μm
To Apply
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
Direct Broadcast (from ITPP to IMAPP to CSPP)
Research to Operations Examples
GOES-R/JPSS Proving Ground
Mobile Device Applications
Hurricanes and Tropical Cyclones
Climate Assessment Participation
210
NOAA/NASA/CIMSS Partnership in the Development & Maintenance of Polar
Orbiting Satellite Direct Broadcast Processing Packages Continues ….
2012
• 12 years of IMAPP continuing
• “CSPP” for Suomi NPP/JPSS
211
1st public release
International MODIS/AIRS
Processing Package (IMAPP)
Funded by NASA since 2000 - freely distributed software
for Aqua and Terra
http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/imapp/
 48 software packages released in 11 years
 More than 1300 users from 67 different countries
 10 direct broadcast workshops held on 5 continents
 Last one was sponsored by WMO in Indonesia Oct 2011
 11 MODIS related software packages
 4 AIRS related software packages
 4 AMSR-E software packages
IMAPP Users
CSPP for Suomi NPP will soon be similar
More than 1300 people have downloaded some part of the IMAPP suite of products
representing 67 different countries and all 7 continents
Direct Broadcast Antenna for NWS
Honolulu and University of Hawaii
Liam Gumley, Kathy Strabala, Jordan Gerth
• Funded by NOAA to install a new polar satellite antenna in
Honolulu; installation completed on August 8, 2012.
• Products are sent in real-time to NWS Forecast Office in
Honolulu and University of Hawaii.
VIIRS Day/Night Band over Hawaiian Islands
NWS Forecast Discussion
HAWAIIAN ISLANDS SATELLITE INTERPRETATION MESSAGE
NWS CENTRAL PACIFIC HURRICANE CENTER HONOLULU HI
1230 UTC SAT NOV 03 2012
BASED ON DATA THROUGH 1200 UTC NOVEMBER 03 2012
…………..
NIGHTTIME SATELLITE IMAGERY FROM THE VIIRS DAY-NIGHT
BAND SHOWS MOSTLY CLOUDY SKIES OVER THE WINDWARD
BIG ISLAND WITH RADAR CONFIRMING SOME LIGHT SHOWERS
IN THE AREA. THE WINDWARD HANA COAST AND LOWER
SLOPES ARE COVERED WITH LOW CLOUDS WHILE THE REST
OF MAUI COUNTY IS CLEAR. ON OAHU...PARTLY CLOUDY
SKIES PREVAIL. ON KAUAI...THE EARLIER CLOUDY SKIES
HAVE CLEARED IN THE EARLY MORNING
HOURS.
$$
MORRISON
IDEA-I: A GLOBALLY CONFIGURABLE IMAPP MODIS SOFTWARE
PACKAGE IN SUPPORT OF AIR QUALITY FORECASTS

IDEA-I is newly added part of IMAPP and
provides to the DB community a version of
Infusing satellite Data into Environmental
air quality Applications (IDEA).

It is globally configurable and freely available,
using Terra or Aqua MODIS MOD04 Aerosol
Optical Depth (AOD) retrievals to identify
local regions of high aerosol loading from
which trajectories are initialized.

A trajectory model provides a forecast of the
horizontal and vertical movement of the
aerosol-laden air parcels over the next 48
hours.

The package includes netCDF output data
files as well as hourly trajectory forecast
images, which can be viewed from a web
browser using PHP software (that is also
included, credit to Bill Bellon).
James Davies, Kathy Strabala, Eva Schiffer, R. Bradley Pierce#,
Hung-Lung (Allen) Huang
Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC/UW-Madison), Madison, WI, USA
#NOAA/STAR/ASPB
jim.davies@ssec.wisc.edu
EUMETSAT, Sopot, 3-7 September, 2012
IMAPP IDEA-I North American
Domain Installation In Support of Air Quality
Forecasts
http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/imapp/idea-i/terra/
R2O: VIIRS Supporting
Operational Forecasters
 AWIPS compatible formats: polar2grid provides
portable, efficient, open source software to reproject
and reformat VIIRS I-Bands for AWIPS
 Installed in DB stations in Alaska, Hawaii and
Wisconsin to support all domains
 Collaborations with DWD Germany, and Australia BOM
to support international met agencies
 GeoTIFF back-end will allow any user to produce
high quality images
Kathy Strabala
Probabilistic Nearcasting of Convective Clouds
Mike Pavolonis, John Cintineo, Justin Sieglaff
1. Track and identify convective clouds
2. Train model with severe and non-severe storms
-- temporal satellite trends, NWP fields, radar
3. Assign probability of severe
P(severe) = f (GOES, NEXRAD, NWP)
4. Outcomes
-- The probabilistic model can
extend the lead time of NWS
severe weather warnings by
~10-20 minutes on average
--The availability of high
temporal resolution
satellite data is critical
(at least every 5 minutes)
GOES-R Fog/Low Cloud Products –
Evaluation by NWS Forecasters
Corey Calvert and Michael Pavolonis
GOES-R
IFR
Probabilities
Visible
Satellite
Imagery
NWS forecasters use the
GOES-R fog/low cloud
products to identify
areas of hazardous low
cloud bases and to
estimate the dissipation
time of radiation fog.
Excerpt from the NWS Sullivan, WI Area Forecast Discussion on
November 21, 2012 at 3:27 AM CST
DENSE FOG COVERS NEARLY THE ENTIRE AREA THIS MORNING. THE CHALLENGE IS DETERMINING JUST
WHEN IT WILL CLEAR. USING A COMBINATION OF THE MODEL SOUNDINGS, THE GOES-R PROVING GROUND
CLOUD THICKNESS PRODUCT AND TIME OF YEAR CONSIDERATIONS...FEEL IT NECESSARY TO DELAY THE
CLEARING OF THE FOG AND THE DENSE FOG ADVISORY UNTIL ABOUT 18Z. THE LOW LEVEL INVERSION IS
STRONG AND IT WILL TAKE A FEW HOURS OF THAT INCREASING GRADIENT WIND TO ERODE THAT
INVERSION. THE ESTIMATED DEPTH OF THE FOG IS AROUND 800-1000FT...SUGGESTING IT WILL TAKE ABOUT
3-4 HOURS AFTER SUNRISE TO CLEAR OUT. WE WERE ENDING THE DENSE FOG ADVISORY AT 10AM AND
THIS SEEMS ABOUT AN HOUR OR SO EARLY...SO WILL STRETCH IT TO NOON FOR A BIT OF A CUSHION.
Development of an Automated Volcanic Cloud Alert System
Mike Pavolonis and Justin Sieglaff
Alert was available at 14:34 UTC; ash advisory was not issued until 16:00 UTC
Eruption of Mt. Cleveland, AK
Examining Rapid Drought Onset Using the Evaporative Stress Index
SPI
PCP
ESI (WK)
2
4
ESI CHANGE ANOMALIES
8
2WK
4WK
• GOES-based
8WK
Evaporative Stress
Index used to depict
areas experiencing
water-related stress
MAY
APR
USDM
Jason Otkin, Martha Anderson (USDA), et al.
JUL
JUN
• Negative weekly
changes in the ESI
(red colors) indicate
that plant health is
deteriorating more
rapidly than normal
SEP
AUG
• Occurrence of large
negative changes
provides additional
lead time that the U.S.
Drought Monitor
depiction will worsen
1
D0 D1 D2 D3 D4
USDM Drought Class
2
3
4
1
2
3
4
1
2
CHANGE INTERVAL (WK)
3
4
• SC WI during 2012
shown to the left
Wildfire Automated Biomass Burning Algorithm
GOES-East WFABBA 2000-2011
(coverage corrected, 0.25° bins)
• Produces fire detections and characterizations for
all satellites in the GOES, MSG, and MTSAT series
• Support for Korea’s COMS is being added
• Producing coverage-corrected summaries to show
trends while minimizing bias created by scan
schedule and block-out zones (annual summaries
from 2000-2011 at right)
• Continuing implementation and validation of the
GOES-R ABI version of the WFABBA
Chris Schmidt
COMS Captures Diurnal Variability in Fire Activity in Borneo
16 August 2012 04:00 – 07:00 UTC
04:00 UTC
04:15 UTC
04:30 UTC
04:45 UTC
05:00 UTC
05:45 UTC
06:00 UTC
06:15 UTC
06:30 UTC
07:00 UTC
GOES-R/JPSS Program
CIMSS/ASPB Participation
GOES-R/JPSS Proving Ground Status
Wayne Feltz, Mike Pavolonis, Tim Schmit, Andy Heidinger, Jordan Gerth,
Scott Bachmeier, Scott Lindstrom, Justin Sieglaff, Lee Cronce, Robert Aune,
Gary Wade, Brad Pierce, Kaba Bah, Will Straka, Jason Otkin, Sarah
Monette, Chris Velden, Ralph Petersen, Russ Dengel
November 13, 2012
CIMSS/ASPB GOES-R ABI Real-time Proxy
Brad Pierce, Tom Greenwald, Todd Schaack, Jason Otkin, Jim Davies, Eva Borbas, Marek Rogal, Kaba Bah,
Justin Sieglaff, Graeme Martin, Jim Nelson, Allen Huang
Real-time Proxy
Framework Support: WRFChem/RAQMS Component
 Nested RAQMS/WRFCHEM aerosol
simulations are now being
produced in real-time to
support GOES-R Proxy
Framework
 GOES-R Proxy aerosol
optical depth (AOD)
simulation captures
observed smoke due to
wildfires in Northern
California
Real-time Proxy AOD/COT (left) and GOES-14 visible image (right) of
August 21, 2012 Northern California Wildfires
GOES-R Proxy Framework supports GOES-R ABI pre-launch activities by providing real-time
GOES Rebroadcast (GRB) files containing synthetic ABI radiances that will be distributed to
AIT and Proving Ground partners for testing GOES-R algorithms and data systems in realtime.
CIMSS/ASPB GOES-R ABI Real-time Proxy
Real-time 16 band Model Imagery
Real-time Validation with GOES
225
GOES-14 in Special Rapid Scan mode
•
•
•
•
•
•
SRSOR (Super Rapid Scan
Operations for GOES-R)
from GOES-14 imager
while it was out of storage
Worked with OSPO to
define schedules
Deciding on daily location
for scanning between midAugust and end of October
Posting many animations
http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu
/goes/srsor/GOES14_SRSOR.html
Many phenomena were
observed: convection, fires,
hurricanes, smoke, etc.
Data to many groups HPC,
OPC, AWC, SPC, etc.
Isaac from GOES-14 Imager water at 1-min time resolution
(click to loop)
SRSOR provided unique information and offers a glimpse into the possibilities
that will be provided at even higher resolutions by the ABI on GOES-R.
GOES-14 SRSOR of Sandy (Visible)
The 1-min interval imagery shows ‘what is happening’, not ‘what has happened’.
GOES-14 SRSOR
Visible
Infrared
The GOES-14 SRSOR animations truly ‘went viral’, demonstrating their unique
information. These datasets will be used for years to better prepare for the ABI.
Super Rapid Scan Operations for GOES-R (SRSOR)
note rapid
convection
229
GOES-14 1-Minute Overshooting Tops
230
Rate of temporal cooling in the
longwave infrared band
Cintineo et al., 2013 (CIMSS)
Rapid convection is often seen on geostationary
231
data before significant radar echo's.
Using GOES UW-Cloud Top Cooling Rates in National
Weather Service Convective Warning Experiments
Justin Sieglaff, Lee Cronce, and Wayne Feltz
First UW-CTC rate (~ -15 K / 15 min
UTC 9/4/2012)
•2002
UW-Cloud
Top Cooling algorithm
diagnoses cloud-top cooling rate of
‘Strong’
ratethunderstorms
(~ -25 K / 15 min
2015
newly UW-CTC
developing
using
UTC
9/4/2012)
high
temporal resolution of GOES
Imager data
T-Storm
Issued
2030
UTC
•Severe
For 2012
the Watch
algorithm
was
improved
to detect growing thunderstorms
Severe
T-Storm
Warning
Issued 2100 UTC
beneath
thin cirrus
clouds
• Key on rapidly increasing visible optical
depth
and Hail
rapidly
decreasing@112101
µm BTs
Golf Ball
Sized
Reported
UTC near
•Utica,
Validation
MN study related satellite cooling
rates to future radar development
(reflectivity,
VIL, hail
size)minutes of leadUW-CTC
provides
25-60
• Used in convective experiments to increase
time ahead
of watch/warning/severe hail
severe t-storm warning lead time
report!
WI
MN
LaCrosse
CIMSS AWIPS II Update
The World Wide
Lightning Location
Network (WWLLN)
provides lightning
information across
the entire Pacific
Basin. CIMSS
wrote the plug-in
to display this data
in AWIPS II.
Image credit: Eric Lau
233
Regional Data Assimilation: Impact of ABI Water Vapor Jason Otkin
• Regional-scale ensemble data assimilation experiments showed that
6-hr precipitation forecasts were more accurate when ABI
brightness temperature observations were assimilated
CRTM Development for the Joint Center for Satellite
Data Assimilation: Scattering Optimization
Tom Greenwald (CIMSS), Ralf Bennartz (AOS) and Jim Davies (CIMSS)
Motivation and approach:
• Develop method to optimize scattering
calculations in the CRTM to support
assimilation of microwave data in
clouds/precipitation for NCEP’s new
hybrid DA system
• Select optimum solution for desired
accuracy using a scattering indicator
Accomplishments:
Experimental results based on cloudresolving WRF model simulations
Target
accuracy
0.5 K
Percentage of
profiles in which
optimum
solution was
achieved
• Calculations for temperature sounding
bands may provide up to a 10-fold
increase in speed relative to current CRTM
• Contributions to CRTM V2.1:
- SOI RT solver (developed at CIMSS)
- User option to set number of streams
Increasing microwave frequency
Sub-optimal in
water vapor bands
WMS (Web Map Server): Delivering Remote
Sensing Content to Mobile Devices, Browsers,
and Desktop GIS
Sam Batzli, Nick Bearson, Russ Dengel, Dave Parker, Dave
Santek
Basic functions:
• Easy Upload of data
• GoogleMaps Display With Animation
Support
• Multiple Overlays and Transparency
2012 Top-5 Updates:
•
•
•
•
•
VIIRS Day/Night Band
Virtual Machine (VM) config. for easy portability
THREADS Catalog support (works in McIDAS V)
First near real-time display of VIIRS in Google
Point & Click Data Value Retrieval (16-bit)
Display of Station Models and AMV as Wind
Flags
More info:
http://wms.ssec.wisc.edu
Station Models
Fog Product Visualization showing what
forecasters see in AWIPS
Russ Dengel, Mike Pavlonis, Sam Batzli
Report from 21 Nov when Chicago air traffic was heavily impacted by fog
AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE
MILWAUKEE/SULLIVAN WI 327 AM CST WED NOV 21 2012 .
TODAY AND TONIGHT...FORECAST CONFIDENCE IS MEDIUM TO HIGH.
DENSE FOG COVERS NEARLY THE ENTIRE AREA THIS MORNING.
THE CHALLENGE IS DETERMINING JUST WHEN IT WILL CLEAR.
USING A COMBINATION OF THE MODEL SOUNDINGS...EXPECTED
INCREASING GRADIENT FLOW...THE GOES-R PROVING GROUND
CLOUD THICKNESS PRODUCT AND TIME OF YEAR CONSIDERATIONS
...FEEL IT NECESSARY TO DELAY THE CLEARING OF THE FOG AND
THE DENSE FOG ADVISORY UNTIL ABOUT 18Z.
SSEC SatCam App is now available in iTunes
Liam Gumley, Bob Holz, Dave Parker, Bruce Flynn, Willem Marais
Verification of HWRF Forecasts for the
USWRP Joint Hurricane Testbed
Tom Greenwald (CIMSS), Tomi Vukicevic (AOML/HRD)
and Jim Davies (CIMSS)
Goals:
Hurricane Earl (2010)
Vertical cloud/precip structure:
Forecast
31 Aug 0600 UTC
CloudSat CPR Obs
31 Aug 0610 UTC
Accomplishments:
• Ability to simulate CloudSat CPR
and use GRIB I/O
• Forecast of hurricane Earl
consistently overestimates (2239%) maximum upper
tropospheric warming as
compared to SSMIS observations
Warm core temporal changes:
Radar reflectivity (dBZ)
• Develop new ways of verifying
Hurricane WRF (HWRF) model
forecasts using passive/active
satellite measurements
• Enhance HWRF Satellite instrument
Simulator built during YR1
• Transition to operations
Real Time Hurricane Forecast
Highlights (Lewis, Tripoli)
As part of NOAA-Hurricane Forecast Improvement Program’s 2012 real-time
demonstration system, >330 forecasts were made for Atlantic basin tropical cyclones.
The UW model (UWN8) outperformed all other regional models for track, and
was a very close second to GFDL for intensity.
Track Error (nm)
COTC
Intensity Error (kt)
AHW4
HWRF
GFDL
UWN8
Secondary Eyewall Formation
(Kossin, Sitkowski, Lewis, Rozoff)
Using USAF and NOAA reconnaissance data, constructed the first ever climatology of the
Secondary Eyewall Formation (SEF) and Eyewall Replace Cycle (ERC) phenomena often
observed in intense tropical cyclones (TC)
Performed optimized feature selection for the operational Bayes model for ERC
Developed a Logistic Regression probabilistic prediction model for ERC
Tested 2-member (Bayes and LR) ensemble, which demonstrates skill
superior to any of the individual models
ERC climatology: three distinct phases
p(ERC) Model Brier Skill Scores for 2008-2011
Model
00-12
hr
12-24 hr 24-36
hr
36-48
hr
Bayes
+18%
+16%
+8%
+11%
Opt.
Bayes
+24%
+12%
+8%
+10%
LR
+14%
+12%
+10%
+8%
Ensemble
+24%
+16%
+14%
+14%
Tropical Cyclone Rapid Intensification
Forecasting (Rozoff, Kossin, Velden, Wimmers)
Tested Bayesian and logistic regression probabilistic models of tropical cyclone (TC) rapid
intensification (RI) in real-time for the 2012 Atlantic and Eastern Pacific hurricane season in
concert with an experimental version of the NHC’s rapid intensification index
An ensemble of our schemes and the experimental NHC scheme
produces superior skill to any individual scheme
Based on promising results summarized below, we are developing a real-time probabilistic RI
scheme incorporating TC structural information from passive microwave imagery
At left: Brier skill scores for Atlantic TCs with RI
thresholds of 25, 30, and 35 kt per 24 h for the RI model
excluding MI predictors (light blue and orange for TCs
with vmax ≥ 25 kt and vmax≥ 45 kt, respectively) and
including MI predictors (dark blue and brown for TCs
with vmax ≥ 25 kt and vmax ≥ 45 kt, respectively).
Creating a New Global Record of Tropical Cyclone Intensity
Collaboration between NOAA/NCDC (Jim Kossin, Ken Knapp)
and CIMSS (Tim Olander, Chris Velden)
The secular record of TC intensity (known as the Best-Track) is heterogeneous by
construction and is not well-suited for trend analysis. Solution: Construct new
homogeneous record using 30 years of global geostationary satellite data
(HURSAT) and apply the Advanced Dvorak Technique (ADT) intensity estimation
algorithm to it.
Have the strongest hurricanes become stronger since 1980?
The increased intensity in the ATLANTIC
Best-Track is robust when reanalyzed
The increased intensity in the GLOBAL
Best-Track is not robust when reanalyzed
Composite of images, full
moon, 29 October 2012
This composite, shot
during the full moon
when the cirrus shield
from Hurricane Sandy
was over Wisconsin,
shows a 22° halo, a
“parhelic” circle, and
other features. A
parhelic circle is parallel
to the horizon, it is the
dimmer circle roughly
centered in the image. It
is formed by reflections
off of and within
vertically or nearly
vertically aligned
hexagonal crystals. The
22° halo is formed by
refraction of light within
the same crystals.
Photo by Chris Schmidt
NOAA/NCDC/CIMSS Participation in Climate
Assessments, Working Groups, & Expert Teams
Jim Kossin is a key participant and author in:
 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC):
o Special Report on "Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and
Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation" (SREX)
o Fifth Assessment Report (AR5)
 United States National Climate Assessment (USGCRP/NCA):
o Changes in Extremes
o Coastal Changes
 World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Expert Team on
Climate Change Impacts on Tropical Cyclones
 United States Climate Variability and Predictability (U.S. CLIVAR)
Working Group on Hurricanes and Climate
Roses in our Future, Again, Again!
from 20 November 2010
250
Yet another Great Year!
Congratulations, and
Happy Holidays
251